Brown (2004) Language Asssessment Principles and Classroom Practices

8/3/2019 Brown (2004) Language Asssessment Principles and Classroom Practices

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CONTENTS

PrefaceText Credits1 Testing, Assessing, and TeachingWhat Is a Test?, 3Assessment and Teaching, 4

Informal and Formal Assessment, 5Formative and Summative Assessment, 6Norm-Referenced and Criterion-Referenced Tests, 7Approaches to Language Testing: A Brief History, 7

Discrete-Point and Integrative Testing, 8Communicative Language Testing, 10Performance-Based Assessment, 10

Current Issues in Classroom Testing, 11New Views on Intelligence, 11Traditional and "Alternative" Assessment, 13Computer-Based Testing, 14

Exercises, 16For Your Further Reading, 182 Principles of Language AssessmentPracticality, 19Reliability, 20

Student-Related Reliability, 21Rater Reliability, 21Test Administration Reliability, 21Test Reliability, 22

Validity, 22Content-Related Evidence, 22Criterion-Related Evidence, 24Construct-Related Evidence, 25Consequential Validity, 26

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iv CONTENTS

Face Validity, 26Authenticity, 28Washback, 28Applying Principles to the Evaluation of Classroom Tests, 30

1. Are the test procedures practical? 312. Is th e test reliable? 313. Does the procedure demonstrate content validity? 324. Is the procedure face valid and "biased for best"? 335. Are the test tasks as authentic as possible? 356. Does th e test offer beneficial washback to the learner? 37

Exercises, 38For Your Further Reading, 413 Designing Classroom Language TestsTest Types, 43Language Aptitude Tests, 43

Proficiency Tests, 44Placement Tests, 45Diagnostic Tests, 46Achievement Tests, 47

Some Practical Steps to Test Construction, 48Assessing Clear, Unambiguous Objectives, 49Drawing Up Test Specifications, 50Devising Test Tasks, 52Designing Multiple-Choice Test Items, 55

1. Design each item to measure a specific objective, 562. State both stem and options as simply and directly as pOSSible, 57

42

3. Make certain that the intended answer is clearly th e only correct one, 584. Use item indices to accept, discard, or revise items, 58

Scoring, Grading, and Giving Feedback, 61Scoring, 61Grading, 62Giving Feedback, 62

Exercises, 64For Your Further Reading, 654 Standardized TestingWhat Is Standardization?, 67Advantages and Disadvantages of Standardized Tests, 68Developing a Standardized Test, 69

1. Determine the purpose and objectives of the test, 702. Design test specifications, 703. Design, select , and arrange test tasks/items, 744. Make appropriate evaluations of different kinds of items, 78

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5. Specify scoring procedures and reporting formats, 796. Perform ongoing construct validation studies, 81

Standardized Language Proficiency Testing, 82Four Standardized Language Proficiency Tests, 83

Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL@),84Michigan English Language Assessment Battery (MEIAB), 85International English Language Testing System (lELTS), 85Test of English for International Communication (TOEIC@), 86

Exercises, 87For Your Further Reading, 87Appendix to Chapter 4:Commercial Proficiency Tests: Sample Items and Tasks, 88Test of English as a Foreign Language (TOEFL 88Michigan English Language Assessment Battery (MEIAB), 93International English Language Testing System (lELTS), 96Test of English for International Communication ( T O E I C ~ , 1005 Standards-Based AssessmentELD Standards, 105ELD Assessment, 106CASAS and SCANS, 108Teacher Standards, 109The Consequences of Standards-Based and Standardized Testing, 110

Test Bias, 111Test-Driven Learning and Teaching, 112Ethical Issues: Critical Language Testing, 113

Exercises, 115For Your Further Reading, 1156 Assessing ListeningObserving the Performance of the Four Skills, 117The Importance of Listening, 119Basic Types of Listening, 119Micro- and Macroskills of Listening, 121Designing Assessment Tasks: Intensive Listening, 122

Recognizing Phonological and Morphological Elements, 123Paraphrase Recognition, 124

Designing Assessment Tasks: Responsive Listening, 125Designing Assessment Tasks: Selective Listening, 125

Listening Cloze, 125Information Transfer, 127Sentence Repetition, 130Designing Assessment Tasks: Extensive Listening, 130

CONTENTS V

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Dictation, 131Communicative Stimulus-Response Tasks, 132Authentic Listening Tasks, 135

Exercises, 138For Your Further Reading, 1397 Assessing SpeakingBasic Types of Speaking, 141Micro- and Macroskills of Speaking, 142Designing Assessment Tasks: Imitative Speaking, 144PhonePass Test, 145Designing Assessment Tasks: Intensive Speaking, 147

Directed Response Tasks, 147Read-Aloud Tasks, 147Sentence!Dialogue Completion Tasks and Oral Questionnaires, 149Picture-Cued Tasks, 151Translation (of Limited Stretches of Discourse), 159

Designing Assessment Tasks: Responsive Speaking, 159Question and Answer, 159Giving Instructions and Directions, 161Paraphrasing, 161

Test of Spoken English (TSE), 162Designing Assessment Tasks: Interactive Speaking, 167

Interview, 167Role Play, 174Discussions and Conversations, 175Games, 175

Oral Proficiency Interview (OPD, 176Designing Assessment: Extensive Speaking, 179

Oral Presentations, 179Picture-Cued Story-Telling, 180Retelling a Story, News Event, 182Translation (of Extended Prose), 182

Exercises, 183For Your Further Reading, 1848 Assessing ReadingTypes (Genres) of Reading, 186Microskills, Macroskills, and Strategies for Reading, 187Types of Reading, 189Designing Assessment Tasks: Perceptive Reading, 190

Reading Aloud, 190Written Response, 191

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Multiple-Choice, 191Picture-Cued Items, 191

Designing Assessment Tasks: Selective Reading, 194Multiple-Choice (for Form-Focused Criteria), 194Matching Tasks, 197Editing Tasks, 198Picture-Cued Tasks, 199Gap-Filling Tasks, 200

Designing Assessment Tasks: Interactive Reading, 201Cloze Tasks, 201Impromptu Reading Plus Comprehension Questions, 204Short-Answer Tasks , 206Editing (Longer Texts), 207Scanning, 209Ordering Tasks, 209Information Transfer: Reading Charts, Maps, Graphs , Diagrams, 210

Designing Assessment Tasks: Extensive Reading, 212Skimming Tasks, 213Summarizing and Responding, 213Note-Taking and Outlining, 215

Exercises, 216For Your Further Reading, 2179 Assessing WritingGenres ofWritten Language, 219Types ofWriting Performance, 220Micro- and Macroskills ofWriting, 220Designing Assessment Tasks: Imitative Writing, 221

Tasks in [Hand] Writing Letters ,Words, and Punctuation, 221

CONTENTS VII

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Spelling Tasks and Detecting Phoneme-Grapheme Correspondences, 223Designing Assessment Tasks: Intensive (Controlled) Writing, 225

Dictation and Dicto-Comp, 225Grammatical Transformation Tasks, 226Picture-Cued Tasks, 226Vocabulary Assessment Tasks, 229Ordering Tasks, 230Short-Answer and Sentence Completion Tasks, 230

Issues in Assessing Responsive and Extensive Writing, 231Designing Assessment Tasks: Responsive and Extensive Writing, 233

Paraphrasing, 234Guided Question and Answer, 234Paragraph Construction Tasks, 235Strategic Options, 236Test ofWritten English (TWE@), 237


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viii CONTENTS

Scoring Methods for Responsive and Extensive Writing, 241Holistic Scoring, 242Primary Trait Scoring, 242Analytic Scoring, 243

Beyond Scoring: Responding to Extensive Writing, 246Assessing Initial Stages of the Process of Composing, 247Assessing Later Stages of the Process of Composing, 247

Exercises, 249For Your Further Reading, 25010 Beyond Tests: Alternatives in AssessmentThe Dilemma of Maximizing Both Practicality and Washback, 252Performance-Based Assessment, 254Portfolios, 256Journals, 260Conferences and Interviews, 264Observations, 266Self- and Peer-Assessments, 270Types of Self- and Peer-Assessment, 271

Guidelines for Self- and Peer-Assessment, 276A Taxonomy of Self- and Peer-Assessment Tasks, 277

Exercises, 279For Your Further Reading, 28011 Grading and Student EvaluationPhilosophy of Grading: What Should Grades Reflect? 282

Guidelines for Selecting Grading Criteria, 284Calculating Grades: Absolute and Relative Grading, 285Teachers' Perceptions of Appropriate Grade Distributions, 289

Institutional Expec tations and Constraints, 291Cross-Cultural Factors and the Question of Difficulty, 292What Do Letter Grades "Mean"?, 293

Alternatives to Letter Grading, 294Some Principles and Guidelines for Grading and Evaluation, 299Exercises, 300For Your Further Reading, 302BibliographyName IndexSubject Index

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PREFACE

The field of second language acquisition and pedagogy has enjoyed a half centuryof academic prosperity, with exponentially increasing numbers of books, journals,articles, and dissertations now constituting our stockpile of knowledge. Surveys ofeven a subdiscipline within this growing field now require hundreds of bibliographic entries to document the state of the art. In this melange of topics and issues,assessment remains an area of intense fascination. What is the best way to assesslearners ' ability? What are the most practical assessment instruments available? Arecurrent standardized tests of language proficiency accurate and reliable? In an era ofcommunicative language teaching, do our classroom tests measure up to standardsof authenticity and meaningfulness? How can a teacher design tests that serve asmotivating learning experiences rather than anxiety-provoking threats?

All these and many more questions now being addressed by teachers,researchers, and specialists can be overwhelming to the novice language teacher,who is already baffled by linguistic and psychological paradigms and by a multitudeof methodological options. This book provides the teacher trainee with a clear,reader-friendly presentation of the essential foundation stones of language assessment, with ample practical examples to illustrate their applicat ion in language classrooms. It is a book that simplifies the issues without oversimplifying. It doesn'tdodge complex questions, and it treats them in ways that classroom teachers cancomprehend. Readers do not have to become testing experts to understand andapply the concepts in this book, nor do they have to become statisticians adept inmanipulating mathematical equations and advanced calculus.

PURPOSE AND AUDIENCEThis book is designed to offer a comprehensive survey of essential principles andtools for second language assessment. I t has been used in pilot forms for teachertraining courses in teacher certification and in Master of Arts in TESOL programs. Asthe third in a trilogy of teacher education textbooks, it is designed to follow myother two books, Principles of Language Learning and Teaching (Fourth Edition,

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X PREFACE

Pearson Education, 2000) and Teaching by Principles (Second Edition, PearsonEducation, 2001). References to those two books are sprinkled throughout the current book. In keeping with the tone set in the previous two books, this one featuresuncomplicated prose and a systematic, spiraling organization. Concepts are introduced with a maximum of practical exemplification and a minimum of weighty definition. Supportive research is acknowledged and succinctly explained withoutburdening the reader with ponderous debate over minutiae.

The testing discipline sometimes possesses an aura of sanctity that can causeteachers to feel inadequate as they approach the task of mastering principles anddesigning effective instruments. Some testing manuals , with their heavy emphasison jargon and mathematical equations, don't help to dissipate that mystique. By theend ofLanguageAssessment: Principles and Classroom Practices, readers will havegained access to this not-so-frightening field. They will have a working knowledgeof a number of useful fundamental principles of assessment and will have appliedthose principles to practical classroom contexts. They will have acquired a storehouse of useful, comprehensible tools for evaluating and designing practical, effective assessment techniques for their classrooms.

PRINCIPAL FEATURESNotable features of this book include the following:

clearly framed fundamental principles for evaluating and designing assessment procedures of all kinds

focus on the most common pedagogical challenge: classroom-based assessment many practical examples to illustrate principles and guidelines

concise but comprehensive treatment of assessing all four skills (listening,speaking, reading, writing) in each skill, classification of assessment techniques that range from con

trolled to open-ended item types on a specified continuum of micro- andmacroskills of language thorough discussion of large-scale standardized tests: their purpose, design,validity, and utility a look at testing language proficiency. or "ability" explanation of what standards-based assessment is, why it is so popular, and

what its pros and cons are consideration of the ethics of testing in an educational and commercial

world driven by tests a comprehensive presentation of alternatives in assessment, namely, portfo

lios, journals, conferences, observations, interviews, and self- and peerassessment


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PREFACE XI

systematic discussion of letter grading and overall evaluat ion of student performance in a course

end-of-chapter exercises that suggest whole-class discussion and individual,pair, and group work for the teacher education classroom a few suggested additional readings at the end of each chapter

WORDS OF THANKSLanguage Assessment: Principles and Classroom Practices is the product of manyyears of teaching language testing and assessment in my own classrooms.My studentshave collectively taught me more than I have taught them, which prompts me tothank them all, everywhere, for these gifts of knowledge. I am further indebted toteachers in many countries around the world where I have offered occasional workshops and seminars on language assessment. I have memorable impressions of suchsessions in Brazil, the Dominican Republic, Egypt, Japan, Peru, Thailand, Turkey, andYugoslavia, where cross-cultural issues in assessment have been especially stimulating.

I am also grateful to my graduate assistant, Amy Shipley, for tracking downresearch studies and practical examples of tests, and for preparing artwork for someof the figures in this book. I offer an appreciative thank you to my friend MaryruthFarnsworth, who read the manuscript with an editor's eye and artfully pointed outsome idiosyncrasies in my writing. My gratitude extends to my staff at the AmericanLanguage Institute at San Francisco State University, especially Kathy Sherak, NicoleFrantz, and Nadya McCann, who carried the ball administratively while I completedthe bulk of writing on this project. And thanks to my colleague Pat Porter forreading and commenting on an earlier draft of this book. As always, the embracingsupport of faculty and graduate students at San Francisco State University is a constant source of stimulation and affirmation.

H. Douglas BrownSan Francisco, California

September 2003


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TEXT CREDITS

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Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following publishers and authors for per-mission to reprint copyrighted material.

American Council on Teaching Foreign Languages (ACTFL), for material fromACTFL Proficiency Guidelines: Speaking (1986); Oral ProfiCiency Inventory (OPI):Summary Highlights.

Blackwell Publishers, for material from Brown, James Dean & Bailey, Kathleen M.(1984). A categorical instrument for scoring second language writing skills. LanguageLearning, 34, 21-42.

California Department of Education, for material from California EnglishLanguage Development (ELD) Standards: Listening and Speaking.

Chauncey Group International (a subsidiary of ETS), for material from Test ofEnglish fo r International Communication (TOEIC).

Educational Testing Service (ETS), for material from Test of English as a ForeignLanguage (TOEFL); Test of Spoken English (TSE); Test ofWritten English (TWE).

English Language Institute, University of Michigan, for material from MichiganEnglish Language Assessment Battery (MELAB).

Ordinate Corporation, for material from PhonePass.Pearson!Longman ESL, and Deborah Phillips, for material from Phillips, Deborah.

(2001). Longman Introductory Course for the TOEFL Test. White Plains, NY: PearsonEducation.

Second Language Testing, Inc. (SLm, for material from Modern Language AptitudeTest.

University of Cambridge Local Examinations Syndicate (UCLES), for material fromInternational English Language Testing System.Yasuhiro Imao, Roshan Khan, Eric Phillips, and Sheila Viotti, for unpublished material.


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CHAPTER 1

TESTING, ASSESSING,AND TEACHING

If you hear the word test in any classroom sening ,your thoughts arc nOt likely to bepositive, plcas,lllt , or :lffirming. The anticipation of a leSt is almost always accompa-nied by feelings of anxiety and self-doubt - ;dong with II fervent hope th . t you w illcome out of it llU ve. Tests seem as unavoidable as tOmorrow's sunrise in virruallyevery kjnd of educational setting. Courses of study in every diSCipline are markedby periodic (csts-milcstom::s of progress (or inadequacy)-and you intensely wishfor a mil'lcuious exemption from these ordeals. We live by tests and sometimes(mcl'aphoricall y) die by lhem .For a quick revisiting of how tests affect many learners, take the followingvocabu lary quiz. All tJlt: words are found in standard English dictionaries, SO rOllshould be able to answer aU six items correctly, right?Okay, take the quiz and circlethe correct definition for each word .

Circle the correct answer. You have 3 minutes to complete this examination!1. polygene a.

b.c.d.

2. cynosure a.b.c.d.

the first stratum of lower-order protozoa containing multiple genesa combination of two or more plastics to produce a highly durablematerialone of a set of cooperating genes, each producing a smallquantitative effectany of a number of multicellular chromosomesan object that serves as a focal point of attention and admiration; acenter of interest or attentiona narrow opening caused by a break or fault in limestone cavesthe cleavage in rock caused by glacial activityone of a group of electrical Impulses capable of passing throughmetals

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2 CliAPTfR 1 Testing. N5eSsing. and Te .1c::hing

3. gudgeon

4. hippogriff

5. reglet

6. Hctile

a.b.c.d.a.b.c.

a jail for commoners during the Middle Ages, located in the villagesof Germany and Francea strip of metal used to reinforce beams and girders in buildingconstructiona tool used by Alaskan Indians to carve totem polesa small Eurasian freshwater fisha term used in children's literature to denote colorful and descriptivephraseologya mythological monster having the wings, claws, and head of agriffin and the body of a horseancient Egyptian cuneiform writing commonly found on the walls oftombs

d. a skin transplant from the leg or foot to the hipa. a narrow, flat moldingb. a musical composition of regular beat and harmonic intonationc. an Aus tralian bird of the eagle familyd. a short sleeve found on women's dresses in Victorian

Englanda. a short. oblong-shaped projectile used in early eighteenth-century

cannonsb. an Old English word for the leading character of a fictionalnovel

c. moldable plastic; formed of a moldable substance such as clay orearth

d. pertaining to the tendency of certain lower mammals to lose visualdepth perception with increasing age

Now, how did that make you feel? Probably just the same as many learnersfee l w hen they take many multiple-choice (or shall we say multipleguess?).timed , Rricky tests . To add to the to rme,llt, if this were a commercially adm ini ste red standardized rest , you might have to wait weeks before learning yourresul tS .Yo u can check you,. answers on this qu iz now by furning to page 16. IfyO ll correctly idcn ti fied three or more items , congratulations! YOli jllst exceededthe average.Of course, this little pop quiz on obscure vocabulary is not :m appropriateexample of classroombased achievement tcsting,nor is it intended to be. It's simplyan illustration of how tests make us [eel much of the timc. can tests be positiveexperiences? am they build a person's confidence and become learn ing experiences? C.1 n they bring OUi tbe best in students? The answer is a resounding yes!Tests need not be degrading, artifiCial, anxietyprovoking experiences. And that'spartly what th is book is a11 about: helping YOll to create more authentic, intrinsica llr


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CHM'TfR I Testing. Assessing, and Te;!ching 3

motivating assessment procedures that are approp riate for their context anddesigned to offcr constnlctive feedback to your students.Before we look at tests and (CSt design in second language education,we needto understand three basic interrelated concepts: testing, assessment, and teaching.Notice that the title of this book is Langtwge Assessmenl, not Language Testing.Thcre are impon'am differences between these tWO constructs. and an even moreimportant relationShip among testing, assessing, and tcaching.

WHAT IS A TEST?A test, in simple terms, is a melhod of measuring a person's abillt;l knowledge, orperformance in a given domain. Let 's look at the components of this definition. Atest is first a method. It is an instrument-a set of techniques, procedures,or ilemsth:lt reqUires performance on the part of the test-taker.10 qualify as a test, the methodmust be exp licit and stnlCtured: multiple-choice questions with prescribed correctanswers; a writing prompt with a searing mbric; an oral intervic.!w based on a question script and a dlecklist of expected n:sponses to be filled in by the administrator.Second, a test must measure. Some tests measure gener..1ability. while olhersfocus on very specific competencies or objectives. A muJti-skili proficiency testdctermines a gene!"AI ability level; a quiz on recognizing correct use of definite articles measures specific knowledge. TIle W"dY the fCSuJtS or measurements are commUll.icated may vary. Some tests. SUdl as a classroom-based shon-answer essay test,may earn the test-take r a letter grade accompanied by the instructor'S marginal comments. Others, particuJarly large-scaJe standardized tests, provide a tO tal numericalscore, a percenlile rank, and perhaps some subscores. If an instrument does notspecify a form of reporting measurement-a means for offering the test-taker somekind of result-then that technique cannot appropriately be defmed as a test.Ncxt,a test measures an individual's ability, knowledge, or performance.Testersneed to understand who the test-takers are.What is their previous experiencc andbackground? Is the test appropriately matdled to their abilities? How should testtakers interpret lheir scores?A leSt measures performance, but the results imply the testraker's ability,or, touse a concept co mmon in the field of linguistic s, competence . Most language testsmeasufC one 's ability to perform language. that is , to speak, write, read,or listen to asubset of language. On the other hand, it is not uncommon to find teStS designed totap into a test-taker's knowledge i!h2!.!! langlL1ge:dcftning a vocabulary item, recitinga granunatical rule, or identifying a rhetorical feature in written discourse.Performance-based tests sample the test-taker 's actual use of language, but fromthose samples the test administrator infers generd l competence. A test of readingcomprehension, for example, may consist of several short reading passages each fol-lowed by a limited number of comprehension questions-a small sample of asecond language learner's total reading behavior. But from the results of that test, theexaminer may infer a certain level of general reading ability.


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4 awrrCR I Tf!S,ing, Assessing, ;lIId TeachingFinally. a 1.eSI measures a given domain. In the case of a proficiency (CSt , eventhough the actual perfonnance on me test involves only a sampling of skills, thatdomain is overnU proficiency in a language-general competence in all skills of alanguage.Olher tests may have more specific criteria. A test of pronunciation might

well be a tCSt of on ly a limited se t of phonemic minimal pairs.A vocabulary lesl mayfocus on on ly the set of words covered in a particular lesson or unit. One of thebiggest obstacles to overcome in conslructing adequate tests is to measure thedesired criterion and nOt include other factors inadvertcmiy, an issue that isaddressed in Chapters 2 and 3.A well-constructed test is an instnlment that provides an :ICCurate measure ofthe test-laker's ability within a particular domain. 11lt:: definition sounds fdirly simple,bur in fdCt ,constructing a good test is a complex task involving both science and art .

ASSESSMENT AND TEACHINGAssessment is :1popular :lnd sometimes misunde rstood Icrm in curren t educationalpractice. You might be tempted to think of testing and assessing as synonymousterms, but they are nOL Tests are prepared administr:nivc proccdu.fCS that occur atidenrifiable times in a curriculum when learners muste r aJl thei r fuculties to offerpeak perfornlance, knowing that their responses arc being measured and evaluated.Assessment. on the other hand, is an ongoing process that encompasses a muchwider domain . Whenever a student responds to a questiOn, offers a comment, ortries Out a new word or SlruCfure, the teacher subconsciously makes an assessmemof the student's performance.Written work-from a joued-down phrase to a formalessay-is performance that u1timatt:1)' is assessed by self, teacher, and possibly other.students. Reading and listening activities lIsuaUy require some SOrt of productiveperformance that the teacher implicitly judges, however peripheral that judgmentmay be. A good teacher never ceases to assess students, whether th ose assessmcntsare incidental or intend cd.Tests, then, arc a subset of assessment; they are certainly not the on ly form ofa'i$Cssment tha t a teacher can make. Tests can be useful devices,but they are only oneamong many procedures and t:lsks that teachers can ultimately uSt: to asscss students.But now, you might be thinking, if you make assessmen ts every time you teachsomething in 1.11C dassroom ,does all teaching involve assessment?Are teachers constantly assesSing students with no interaction that is assessment-free?'nlC U l w e r depends on your perspective. For optim:.l learning to take place,stlldent'i in the classroom must have the freedom to experiment, to tryout their ow nhypotheses about language without feeling that their ove.ra U competence is beingjudged in temlS of those trials and errors. I.n the same way that tournament tennispbyers must, before a tournament, have the freedom to pra


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cw,PTER 1 Tesling. Assessing. and Teaching 5

graded, Teaching sets up the practict: games of language learning: the opportunitiesfor learners to listen. think, take risks, set goals, and process feedback from the"coach- and then recyde through the skills that they are trying to m:lSter, (A diagramof the rel:uionsh ip among testing, teaching, and assessment is found in Figure 1.1.)

E:vASSESSMENT

TEACHING

Figure 1. 1. Tests, assessment and teaching

At the same time,during these practice activities, teachers (and tennis coaches)are indeed observing snldents ' performance and making varions evaluations of cadIlearner: How did the performance compare to previolls performance? Whichaspects of the performance were better than others? Is tlle learner pedorming upto an c..'Cpccred potential? How does the performance compare to that of ot hers inthe same learning communi ty? In the ideal dassroom , all these obscrv.lIions feedintO tlle way the teacher provides instruction to each student .

Informal and Formal AssessmentOne way to begin untangling the lex ical conundnml c reated by distinguishingamong tests, assessment,and teaching is to distinguish between informal and formalassessment. Informal assessment can (:Ike a number of forms, star ting with incidemal , unplanned comments and responses, along with coaching and otherimpromptu feed back to the student. Examples include saying j o b l kGoodw r k ~ D i d you say can or can 't?" 4l think you meant to say you broke the glass,not you break the glass," or putting a @ on some homework.Informal assessment does not SLOp there. A good deal of a reacher 's informalassessment is embedded in dassroom tasks designed to elicit performance withoutrecording results and making fLxed judgments about a student 's competence.E.xamples at this end of the continuum are marginal comments on papers,responding to a drAft of all essay, advice about how to bener pronounce a wo rd, a


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6 C ~ f 1 T E / l Testing, Assessing, ,mel Teaching

suggestion for a strategy for compensating for a reading difficulty, and showing howto modify a student's note-taking to bener remember the coment of a lecture.On the other hand, formal assessments arc exercises or procedures specifica lly designed to tap into a storehouse of skills and knowledge.They are systematic,

planned sampling tedutiqucs constructed to give teacher and student an appraisalof studem achievement. To extend the tennis analogy, formal assessments are tbetournament games that occur periodically in the course of a regimen of practice.Is fonnal assessment the same as a test? We can say that aU tests arc form31assessments, but not all fonnal assessment is testing. For example, you might use astudent's journal or portfoliO of materi31s as a formal assessment of the allainment

of certain course objectives, but it is problematic to call those two procedures"tests .M A systematic set of observations of a student's frequen


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F

01APJ'ER 1 Tes ting, A55eS5iog. and Teachin8 7

yOllr students might otherwise view as a summalivc test? Can you offer yO llr Stu-dents ao opportunity to convert testS into "learning experiences ? We will take lipthat dl3.lIenge in subsequent chapters in th is book.

NormReferenced and Criterion-Referenced TestsAnotber dichotomy that is important to clarify here and th at aids in sorting outcommon terminology in assessment is tbe distinction between normreferencedand criterion-referenced testing. In norm-referenced tests , each tcst-taker's scoreis interpreted in relation to a mean (average score) , median (middle score) , standarddeviation (extent of variance in scores), and/or percentile rank.The purpose i.o suchtests is to place tcsttakers along a mathematical continuum in rank order. Scores areusually reponed back to the test-taker in the form of a numerical score (forexample, 230 o ul of 300) and a percentile rank (such :IS 84 percent , w hich meansthat the test-taker's score was higher than 84 percent of the total number of testlakers,but lower than 16 percent in that administration). Typical of norm-referencedtests are standardized testS like the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAl 4J or the Test ofEnglish as a Foreign Language (TOEFL") , imended to be administered to large audiences, with resuils efficiently disseminated to tesHakers.SUdl tes ts mUSt bave fixed,predetermined responses in a format that can be scored quickJy at minimumexpense. Money and cfiiciency are primary concernS in these tests.

Criterion-referenced tcsts , on the otber hand ,arc designed to give test-takersfeedback, usuaUy in the fonn of grades, on specific course or lesson objectives_Classroom tests involving lhe srudents in only one class, and connec ted to a c urriculum, are typical of criterion-referenced testing. Here, mu ch lime and effort on thepart of the teacher (test administratOr) are sometimes required in order to deliveruseful, appropriate feedback to studems, or what O iJer ( 1979. p. 52) called i s t r u clion al v i l In a c ri terion-referenced tcs t, the distribution of students ' scores lCroSSa continuum may be of little concern as long as the instrument assesses appropriateohjectives. In Ltmguage Assessme1lf, with an ludience of classroom languageteachers and teachers in training, and with its emphasis on classroom-based assessment (as opposed to standardized, large-scale tcsting), c riterion-referenced testing isof more prominent interest than norm-referenced testing.

APPROACHES TO LANGUAGE TESTING: A BRIEF HISTORYNow that yOll have a reasonably clear grasp of some common assessment terms,wenow rum to one of the primary concerns of this book: the creation and use o f tests,particularly classroom tests. A brief history of language testing over the past halfcentury w ill serve as a backdrop to an understanding of classroom-based t'esting.

HistOrically, language-testing trends and practices have followed the shiftingsa nds of reaching me thodology (for a description of these trends, see Brown,


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8 CHAPTfR ' Testing. Assessing. and Tei/ching

Tetlcbing by Prlndples [hereinafter TBP) ,Chapter 2) . For example, in the 1950s, anera of behaviorism and special anention to contrastive analysis. testing focused onspecific language elements such as the phonological , grammatical , and lexical contrasts between two languages. In the 1970s and 1980s, communicative theories oflanguage brought with them a more integrative view of testing in whlch specialistsdaimed that t whole of the communicative event was considerably greater thanthe sum of its linguistic elements& (Clark, 1983, p . 432). Today, tcst designers are stillchallenged in their quest for more authentic, valid instruments that simulate realworld interaction.

DiscretePoint and Integrative Testing11tis historical perspective underscores (\ '10 major approaches to language testingthat were debat.ed in the 1970s and early I980s. TIlcse approaches stiU prevail today,even if i.n mutated form : the dlOice between discretepoint and integr.uive testingmethods (OUCI', 1979). Discretepoint tests are const ructed o n the assump tio n thatlanglt:lge can be broken down into its componem parts and that those parts can betested successfully. These components an:: the sk ills of UStening, speaking, reading,and writing , and various unilS of language (discrete points) of phonologYIgraphology, morphology, lexicon, syntax, and discourse . It was claimed that anoverall language proficiency test, then , should sample all four skills and as many linguistic discrete points as pos!!>ible.

Such an approach demanded a decontextuali ..a tion that often confused thetest-taker. So , as the profession emerged into an era of emphasizing communication,authentiCity, and context, new approaches were sought. Oller (1979) argued thatlanguage competence is a unified set of interJ.Cting abilities that cannot be testedseparately. His claim was that communicative competcnce is so global and requiressuch integration (hencc the term "integrative- testing) that it cannot be captured inadditive tes ts of grammar, reading, vocabulary. and other discrete points of language.Others (among them C . ko , 1982. and Savignon, 1982) soon followed in their suppOrt for integrative tes ting .

What docs an integrative test look like? Two types of te sts have hi storicallybeen claimed to be examples of integrative tests: doze teSls and dictations .A dozetest is a reading passage (pe rhaps 150 to 300 words) i.ll which roughly every sixth0 1' seventh word has bet:n deleted; the test-taker is required to supply words that fitinto those blanks. (See Chapter 8 for a full discussio n of doze testing.) O ller (1979)

I Frequent references are made in this book 10 companion vol umes by Lhe author.Principles of umguage Leaming and TeachiflE (pU j ) (Founh Edition, 2000) is abasic teacher reference book on essential foundations of second language acquisitionon which pedagogical practices arc based. Teachf" E by Pri1lclples (TEP) (SecondEdition. 200 I ) spells out that pedagogy in practical terms for the language teacher.


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OW'TER' Testing. AssessinS- and Teaching 9

claimed that doze test results are good measures of overall proficiency. Accordingto theoretical cOnStruCLS underlying this claim, the ability to supply appropriatewords in blanks requires a number of abilities that lie at the bean of competence ina language: knowledge of vocabuJary, grammatical strucrure, discourse st ructure,reading skills and strategies, and an internalized "expectancy" grammar (enablingonc to predkl an item lhat will come next in a seque.nce). It was argued that successful comple.tion of doze items taps into all of those abilities, wl:tich were said tobe the essence of global language proficiency.

Dictation is a familiar language-teaching tt.'dlnique that evo lved into a testingtechnique. Esscmially, learners listen to a passage of 100 to 150 words read aloud byan admjnistr'J.tor (or audiotape) and write what they bear, using correct spelling .TIlelistening portion usually has three stages: an ornl reading without' pauses; an oralreuding witJ, long pauscs between every phrase (to give the learner time to writedown what is heard);and a third reading at normal speed to give test- takers a chanceto check what they wrote. (Sec Chapter 6 for more discussion of dictation as anassessment device.)Sup porters arguc that dictation is an integralive test because it lapS into grammatical and discourse competencies required for other modes of performance in alanguage. Success on a dictation requires careful listening, reproduction in writingof what is heard, efficient shon-ter:m memory, and , to an extent, some expectancyrules to aid the short-term memory. Funher, dictation test result's tend to correlatestrongly with other tesLS of profiCiency. Dictation testing is usually classroomcentered since large-scale administration of dictations is quite impractical from ascoring standpoint. Reliability of scoring criteria for dictation tests can be improvedby designing mUltiple-choice or exact-word cloze test scoring.

Iwponents of integrative test methods soon centered their arguments on whatbecame known as the unitary trait hypothesis, which suggestt':d an "indivisibleview of language proficiency: that vocabulary, grammar, phonology, the f o u r s k i l l sand other discrete points of language couJd not be disemangJcd from each other inlanguage performance . The unitary trait hypothcsis contended that there is a genera l factor of language proficiency such that all the discrete pOillLS do not add up tothat whole.

Ot hers argued strongly against the unitary trait pOSition. In a study of st udentsin Brazil and the Philippines, Farhady (1982) found signlfic:mt and widely varyingdifferences in performance on an ESt proficiency test, dcpt':nding on subjects' nativecountry, major field of study,and graduate versus undergraduate status. For example,Brazilians scored very low in listening comprehension and reillti\'ely high in readingcomprehension. Filipinos, whose scores on five of the six componenLS of the testwere conS iderably higher than Bra:dlians' scores, were actual ly lower than Braziliansin re3ding comprehension scores. Farhady's contentions were supported in otherresearch that seriously questioned the unitary trait hypothesis. Finally, in the face ofthe evidence, O ller retreated from his earlier stand and admitted that "the unit3rytro.it hypothesiS was w r o n g (1983 , p . 352).


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10 CWoPTfR' Testing. A 5 ~ ; n g . and Teaching

Communicative Language TestingBy lhe mid-1980s, the language-testing field had aba ndoned argumentS abom theunilary trait hypo thesis and had begun to focus on designing communicativelanguagNesting tasks. Bachman and Palmer (1996, p . 9) include among Kundamenia l- principles of language testing the need for a correspondence between language leSt performance and language use:"ln order for a particular language test tobe useful fo r itS intended purposes , test performance must correspond in demonstl"'Jb le ways to language use in non-teSt situations." The problem that languageassessment expens faced was that tasks tended to be artificial, contrived, andunlike ly to mirror language use in real life. As Wei r ( 1990, p. 6) noted, "Integrativetests such ;IS doze only tell us about a candidate's linguistic competence. llley donot te ll us anything directly about a student 's performance ability."And so a quest for aUlhenticity was launched , as test deSigne rs centered oncommunicative performance . FoUowing Canale and Swain 's ( 1980) model of comlUunicative co mpete nce . Baclunan ( I ~ ) O ) proposed a model of language competence co nsistin g of organizational and pragmatic competence, respectivelysubdivided into grammatical and textual components, and into iIlocu tionary andsociolinguistic components , (Further discussion of both Cam le and Swain's andBachman's mode ls can be found in PUT, Chapte r 9.) Bachman and Palmer (1996.pp.700 also emphasized the importance of strategic competence (the ab ility toemplo)' communicative strategies to compensa te for breakdowns as well as [ 0enh ance the rhetorical effect of utterances) in the process of communication. Allelements of the model , especia lly pr.lgmatic and strategic abilities, needed to beincluded in the constructs of language testing and in the ac tual performancerequired of testrakers.Communicative testing presented challenges to test deSigners, as we will see insubsequent chapters of this book. Test constructors began to identify the kinds ofrealworld tasks that language learners were caJled upon to perform. It was dear thatthe contextS for those tasks were extraordimlrily w idely varied and that the sam-pling of tasks for anyone assessment procedure needed to be validated by what language users actually do wi th language .Weir (1990, p. II ) reminded his readers thatmeasure language proficiency . . . account must now be taken of: where, when ,how, with wholll ,and why language is 10 be used ,and on what IOp ics ,and with whateffec t ." And the assessment ficJd became more and more concerned with the:tlIthentidty of tasks and the genuineness of lexts. (See Skehan , 1988. 1989, for asurvey of communicative testing research.)

Performance-Based AssessmentIn language co urses and progr.tms around the wo rld, test deSigners are now tacklingthis new and more s[udent-centercd agenda (Alderson. 200 1, 2(02). Instead of justoffering p:aper-and-pencil selective response test's of a pletho ra of separate items,perfomlanceba.sed assessment of language typically involves o ral production,


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CHAf'TCR1 Tesfing, A5S1!S5ing. and Teachin8 11

written production, open-ended responses, integrated performance (across sk illareas), group perfonllance, and other interactive tasks. To be sure, such assessmentis ti.me-coosuming and therefore expensive,hut those extra efforts are paying off inthe form ofmore direct testing because students are assessed as they perform actualor simulated real-world tasks. In technical terms, higher comcm validity (seeChapter 2 for an explana tion) is achieved btcausc:: learne rs arc measured in theprocess of perfornling the targeted linguistic acts.

to an English language-teaching context, performance-based assessmem meansthat you may have a difficu lt time diStinguis hing between formal and informalassessment . If you rely a little less on formally structured tests and a little more onevaluation w hile students are performing va rious tasks , you will be taking somesteps toward meeting the goals of performance-based testing. (Sec Chapter 10 for afunher discussion of performancebased assessment .)A dl3racteristi


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12 cw.rnlf ' Tes/ing. Assessing. and Teaching

tests that are timed in a multip le-choice fonnat consiSting of a multiplicity of logicconstr.tined items, many of which are inauthentic .However, research on intelligence by p!t)'chologists like Howard Gardner.Robert Sternberg, and Daniel Goleman has begun to [urn the psychometric wo rldupside down. Gardner (1983, 1999), fo r example, extended the traditional view ofintelligence to seven different components.Z He accepted the u-aditional concep tualizations of linguistic intelligence and logicalmathematical intelligence on whichstandardized IQ tests are based, but he induded five o ther "frames of m i n d in histheory of multiple intelligences:

spatial intelligence (t he ability to fLOd your way around an enVironment, toform menta l images of reality) musical intclligence (the ability to perceive and create pitch and rhythmiCpatterns)bodily-k inesrhetic intelligence (fine motor movement, athletic prowess) inte rperson:1I intelligence (the ability to understand others and how theyfeel , and to interac t effectively with them) intrapersonal intelligence (the ability to lUlde rsland oneself and to develop asense of self-identity)

Raben Sternberg 0988, 1997) also charted new territory in intelligence research in recognizing creative thinking and manipulative su-ategies as pan of intelIigence . All sman- peop le aren 't necessarily adept at fast, reactive thinking. Theymay be vcry innovative in being able to think beyond th e normal limits imposed byexisting tests, but they may need a good deal of processing time to enact this creativity. Other fo rms of smartness are found in those who know how to manipulatetheir environment, namely, other people. Debaters , politicians, successful salespersons, smooth talke rs, and co n artists are all smart in their manipulative ability to persuade others to think their way, vote for them , make a purchase, or do somethingthey might not otherwise do .More recently, Daniel Goleman'S (1995) co nce pt o E (emotional quotient)bas sp urred us to underscore the importance of the emotions in our cognitive processing. Those who manage their emotions-especially emotions that can be detrimental- t e nd to be more capable of fu lly intelligent processing . Anger, grief,resentment, self-doubt , and other feel ings can easily impair peak performance ineveryday tasks as well as highcr-order problem so lving .These new conceptualizations of intelligence have not been universallyaccepted by the academic co mmunity (see White, 1998, for example). Nevertheless,th eir intuitive appeal infused the decade of the 1990s with a sense of both freedomand responsibility in our testing agenda. Coupled with parallel educational reformsat the time (Armsuong , 1994), they helped to free us from relying exclusively on'I For a summary of Gardner's theory of intelligence, see Brown (2000. pp . 100-102).


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OPTER I Testing, "'S5eS5inS. and Teachin8 13

timed , discrete-point, analytical tests in measuring language. We were prodded tocautiously combat the potential tyranny of"objectivity"and its accompanying imperSOllal approach. But we also assumed the responsibility for tapping into whole language skiUs, learning processes. and the ab ili ty to negotiate mean ing. Our dlallengewas to test interpersonal. creative. communicative, interactive skills,and in do ing soto place some trust in our subjectivity and intuition.

Traditional and "Alternative" Assessmentlmplied in some of the earlier description of performance-based dassroom assessment is a trend to supplement traditional tes t deSigns willi alternatives that are moreambeoric in their elicitation of meaningful communica tion . Table 1. I highlights differences between the two approaches (adapt ed from Armstrong, 1994, and Bailey,1998, p.207).Two caveats need to be stated here. First, the concepts in Table 1.1 representsome ove rgeneralizations and should therefore be considered with ca ution. It is dif-ficult, in fact, (0 dr.tw a clear line of distinction between what Armstrong ( 1994) andBaiJcy (1998) have caU


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14 CHAPTffl I Testing. Assessing. and Te1Jching

subjective evaluation,more individualization, and morc interaction in the process ofoffering feedback . The: payoff for the latter. however. co mes with more useful feedback to students , the potcntial Jor intrinsic motivation, and ultimately a morecomplete description of a student 's abil ity. (See Chapler 10 (or a complete [fCatmentof alternatives in assessment.) More and more educators :lnd adVOC:ttes for educa-tional reform arc arguing for a de-emphasis on large-scale standardized te stS in favorof building budgets that will offer the kind of comcxtlmlizcd, communicativeperformance-based assessment that w il l bener facitit:ue learning in our schools. OnChapter 4 , issues surrounding s tandardized testing are addressed at length .)

compute r-Based TestingRecen t years have seen a burgeoning of assessmcm in wh ich the lCS t-taker performsresponses on a com puter. Some comp ut er-bascd rests (a lso known as "compUlerass isted "Or w e b - b a s e d tests) are small scale "home-grown" tes ts ava illible on we I>-si tes . Others arc standardjzed, largc-scale tests in which thousands Or even tens ofthousands of test-t'akers are invo h'cd . Students receive pro mpts (o r probes , as theyare sometimes referred to ) in thc form of spoken or wriHen stimu li from tile compute rized test and are requ ired to type (o r in some cases, spcak) their responses .A1m os t a ll computer-based tcst items have fIXed , closed-end ed responscs; however,test s like the Test of English as a Foreign Language (fOEFL offer a written essaysec tion that must be scored by hUUlans (as opposed to automatic, e lectronic, o rmachine scoring).As this book goes to press, the deSigners of the TOEFL are on theverge of offering a spoken Eng lish section .

A specific type of computer-based tcst , a com pu ter -ada ptive test, has beenavailable for many years but has recently gainel1 momentum . In a computer-adaptivelest (CAn , each test-taker receives a se t of questions that meet the test specifications and that arc gencraJJy appropriate for h is or her performance levd . Th e CATstarts with questions o f moderate difficul ry.As test-takers answer eadl question, thecomputer scores th e questio n and uses that information , as we ll as tllC responses toprevious questions, to dete rmine w hidl question will be presented next. As long asex.1minees respond correctly, the compu ter typica lly se lectS questjons of grea te r orequal d ifficulty. Incor rect :mswers, however, lypically bring questions of lesser orequa l difficul ty. Tht! comp uter is programmed to fu lfi ll th e tcs t design as it continuously adjusts to find quest ions of approp riate d ifficulty for test-takers at a ll perfo rman ce levels. In CATs, the test-take.r sees only one question at a time , and thecomputer scores each qu es tion before selecti ng (he next one .As a result , tes t-takerscannot sk ip questions, and once tllCY have entered and confirmed thei r answers,they cannot rerum to questions or to any earJjer part of the test .

Computer-based l"esting,with or witlIom CAT tedlllology,o fft!tS these advantages:cI:lSsroombascd tes tingse lf.directed testing o n V".!.rious aspects of a language (vocabu lary, grammar,discourse , onc or all of the four skills, et c.)


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cm.I'TlIl I Tesfing, Asse55ing. andTeilch ing 15

pr.tcticc for upcoming high-stakcs standardized tests some individualization , in the case of CATs large-scale standardized tests thai can be administered casil)' to thousands of

tcs t-takers at many different stations, then scored electronica lly for rapidre po ning of results

Of course , some disad\rantagcs are presem in our currenl predile(:lion for compu terizing testing_Among them:

Lack of sec urity and the possib ili ty of cheating are inhe rent in c1assroombased, unsupervised compute rized tests.Occasional o m e g r o w Quizzes that appear on unofficial websites may bemistaken for valida ted assessmen ts.

Th e mu ltiple-choi ce forma t p referred for most computer-based tests comainsthe usual po tential fo r flawed item design (see Chap ter 3) . Open-end ed responses are less likely to appear because of lhe need forhuman scorers, with all th e attendant issues of COSt, reliability, lind tu rnaround time.

'111c human interactive clement (especially in oral production) is absent _More is said about computer-based testing in subsequent chaplers, especially

Chap ter 4, in a discussion of largescale standardized testin g. In add itio n, the following webs i[t"s provide further informatio n and examples o f computerbased tests:

Educational Testing ServiceTest of English as 3. Foreign LanguageTcst of English for International Communicationlntem:nionaJ English Language Testing SystemDave'S ESL Cafe (computerized quizzes)

www .ets.orgwww .tocfl.orgwww .todc .comwww .ie1ts.o rgwww.e slcafe.com

Some argue th at computer-based testing, pushed to its ul timate level, might miligate agai nst recent c fforts to rerurn tcsting (0 its artful form of be ing tailored byteachers for their dassrooms, of being de signed [Q be performance-based , and ofa llOW ing a teache r- student d ialogue to form th e basis o f assessment. This need no tbe the Cllse. Co mplllcr tcchnolo!.')' a m bc a boon to co mmun icative languagetesting.Tead1ers and test-makers of the fu ture w ilJ have access to an ever-increasingrdnge of too ls 10 safeguard against impcrsonaJ , stamped-om fo rmulas fo r aSsessment.By using ted lOoJogical innovations creatively, testers will be able to enhance authenticity, 10 increase interactive c.'Xchange, and to promote auto no my.

I I I I IAs rou TCad this book , I hope you \"\-' ilI do so with an appreciat ion for the place

of testing in assessment , and with a sense of the in terconn ection of assessment and


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16 CHAmll I Testing. Assessing. C1nd TeClchingteaching . Assessment is an integral part of the teaching-learning cyde. In an interactive, communicative c urriculum, assessment is alm ost constant. Tests, w hich are asubset of assessment , can provide authenticity, motiV"dtion, and feedback to thelearner. Tests are essential components of a successful cu rriculum and one of several partners in the learning process. Keep in mind these basic p rinciples:

1. r o d i c assessments, both formal and informal, can increase motivation byse rving as milestones of srudent progress.

2. Appropriate assessments aid in [he reinforcement and retention of informalion .3. Assessments can co nfirm areas of strength and pinpoint areas needing furtherwork.4. Assessments can provide a sense of periodiC closure to modules within a curric ulum .

5. Assessments can promote student autonomy by encoura ging students' se lfevruu3tion of their progress .6. Assessments can spur learners to set goals fo r themselves,7. Assessments can aid in evaluating teadling effectiveness.Answers to the vocabulary quiz on pages 1 and 2: l c, 2a, 3d, 4b, Sa, 6c.

EXERCISES[Note: (I) lndividual work; (G) Group or pair work; (C) Whole-class d iscussion .)1. (G) In a smaU group , look at Figure 1.1 on page 5 that shows tes ts as a subset

of assessment and the laner as a subset of teaching.Do yOll agree with thisdiagrammatic dep iction of th e three terms? Consider the following classroomtcaching techniques : choral drill, pair pronunciation practice, reading aloud ,infomlation gap task, Singing songs in English , wri ting a description of ulewee ken d 's activities.What proportion of ellch has an assessment face t to il?Share your co nclusions with the resl of the class.2. (G) TIle chart below shows a hypo thetical tine of distinction between fonnativc and summative assessment . and betwecn informal and forma! assessment.As a group , place the foUowing techniques /procedures into one of the fourceUs and justify your decision. Share your results with othe r groups and disCllSS any differences of opinion .

Placement testsDiagnostic testSPeriod ic achievemem testsShort po p qujzzes


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-Standanlized proficiency lestSFinal examsPortfolios

CWol'ml' Tes ting, Mres5ing, and Teiiching 17

JournalsSpeeches (prepared and rehearsed)Oral presentatiOns (prepared , but not rehearsed)Impromptu student responses to teacher's questionsStudent-written response (one paragrnph) to a reading assignmentDrafting and revising writingFinal essays (after several drafts)Student oral responses to tcacher questions after a videotaped lectureWhole class open-ended discussion of a topic

formative Summative

Informal

Formal

3. (l ie) Review the distinction be tween normreferenced and cril'crionreferenced testing. If norm-referenced tests typica lly yie ld a distribution ofscores that resemble a beUshaped curve, what kinds of distributions aretypical of classroom acruevement tests in your experience?4. ( l ie) Restate i.n your own words lhe argumcill betwecn unilary trai t proponems and discrete-point testing advocates.Why did OUer back down from theunitary trait hypothesis?5. eve)Why are doze and dictation considered to be integra live tests?

6. (G) Look at the lisl of Gardner's seven intelligences. Take one or two intelligences, as assigned to your group, and brainstorm some teaching activitiesthat foster thai type of intelligence. Then , bminstorm some assessmen t tasks


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18 CHIoPTrR 1 Testing. Assessing, and Teach ing

that may presuppose the same intelligence in order to perfo rm we ll . Shareyour resulls with othe r groupS.

7. (C) As a whole-c.lass discussion, brainstorm a variery of test tasks that classmembers have e.xperienced in learning a foreign language. Then decidewhi


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Documents

Brown (2004) Language Asssessment Principles and Classroom Practices